


dinbolly

by facingthenorthwind (spacegandalf)



Series: losers who deserve each other [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Community: HPFT, Fluff, M/M, meet the parents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 06:01:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15333366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacegandalf/pseuds/facingthenorthwind
Summary: In which Scorpius plans a new life in the Pacific, Albus is so nervous he forgets his own name, and there is a life-size cardboard cutout of Viktor Krum.[can be read as a standalone]





	dinbolly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [endless_dreamer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/endless_dreamer/gifts).



> Here it is, the scorbusquel at the request of shreya. Thank you to shreya, lisa, kayla, cass, isobel, kristina, bianca and anyone else who helped me out, you're all legends.
> 
> "You know what they say about wishes being horses you can't look in the mouth or whatever" is a mixup of two different idioms: "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride" and "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth", in case you're not familiar! I imagine it would be difficult to google.

"Scorp, I promise it'll be fine," Albus's head said from the fireplace. He was currently flooing the Malfoy mansion, but apparently there was some nonsense about 'rules' where 'he wasn't allowed to floo there without Mr and Mrs Malfoy's permission', so only his head was visible.

Scorpius could really do with a hug.

"They weren't angry when you said you were bi," Albus reasoned, and Scorpius rolled his eyes.

"Neither were yours! But you still thought me being your boyfriend would piss them off. Same on my end, you twit."

"Well, if they do react poorly, you can come to mine. Have a few galleons on you for the Knight Bus and -- well, you can't ask to be taken to my place, Dad'll kill me, but you can take the Knight Bus to the Leaky and then Floo from there? Tom'll let you, you know he will."

Scorpius considered this. "I don't -- I like home, though, Al. I know you don't like yours, but I…"

For a moment, he felt so overwhelmingly _sad_ at the prospect of anything changing that he considered not telling them at all. That eliminated the risk, didn’t it? But that wasn’t a solution, not really: Scorpius didn't want to have secrets. Again and again his parents had emphasised that he shouldn't feel like he had to keep secrets from them; that they would always love him; that if he was in trouble they would rather know so they could try to help. And those things were all well and good when they were hypothetical, but when it was real? Scorpius was more afraid than he was willing to admit.

But Scorpius couldn't imagine _not_ being Albus's boyfriend, either. Sure, it had only been six months, but he was so happy in his new role; it felt so _right_.

Before Scorpius could work out how to express any of the things he was feeling (he suspected they’d be flooing until Seventh Year if they waited around for him to find the right words), there was a sound at the door and just as the connection cut off he heard a shout of pain as Albus bumped his head on the fireplace. Again. The first time Scorpius had immediately flooed him back to check he wasn’t hurt, but this was the fourth time. Perhaps one day Albus would learn to cover the back of his head.

As the door closed Scorpius felt a little like he was going to the executioner's block, except instead of the executioner being a muscly, hooded man it was his own father, recently returned from the farmers' market.

"You won’t believe how good the cherries are," Astoria said, walking into the kitchen laden with bags, Draco similarly loaded with farmers' market spoils. "We bought two boxes, come try one."

Scorpius tried to act normally but he hadn't even reached for the cherries before Draco said, "What's wrong?"

Scorpius froze, hands outstretched towards the kitchen counter.

"Darling?" Astoria said, sounding worried.

There was no point in pretending. It would just be putting off the inevitable. "Uh," Scorpius said, all previous scripts he had thought up for the occasion gone. "I--"

Maybe he should just run away and change his name and go live in France. His French was a bit shit, but he knew _some_ , so it wouldn't be that bad.

"You, um, you know what I told you last summer? About -- about being bi?" He had finally managed to regain control of his limbs and lowered them so he didn't look like he had been petrified.

He had not yet worked up the courage to look at either of his parents, so he did not see the look they exchanged.

"Well, I -- I have a boyfriend?" The world hadn’t ended yet. No tragic and unexplained explosion had occurred to end his current suffering. He… was not sure if he was happy or not with this development.

“Do we know him?” asked Draco, taking the opportunity to eat one of the cherries. That was good, right? That he was calm enough to eat stone fruit during this conversation?

Scorpius licked his lips. His mouth felt so dry. He wondered whether Albus knew any French.

“Sort of?”

“What do you mean, darling?” Astoria asked, and Scorpius wished he’d waited until everyone was sitting down for this conversation. It felt impossibly awkward for them all to be hovering around the kitchen island for this.

“It’s… it’s Al? Albus Potter.” Scorpius was rethinking his move-to-France plan. France was too close. They spoke French in Tahiti, didn’t they?

“Albus Potter,” Draco repeated flatly. “The son of Harry Potter. Whom… you spent Christmas with.”

Scorpius winced. “Yes? I mean, he wasn’t my boyfriend then. Well, sort of. If his parents ask, we were boyfriends then, but really we were just pretending.” He had the oddest feeling like a lie was getting away from him even though he was telling the truth. His parents also apparently thought he was lying, from the looks on their faces. This was terrible.

Draco seemed to consider this for a long moment before settling on, “... Why?”

“Al … Al wanted to annoy his parents and he thought dating me would do it?” He’d heard Tahiti was lovely this time of year. He’d heard Tahiti was lovely all year round, actually. The perfect place to start a new life.

“You’re not doing it to annoy us, though,” Astoria said, a statement instead of a question. She seemed like the safer person to look at, so Scorpius took the risk — she looked… amused, if anything. 

“No, no, I’m not, I promise,” Scorpius said, tripping over his words in an effort to get them out. “It — it stopped being pretend once Al kind of… cottoned on, you know.”

Now Astoria really _was_ trying not to laugh at him. “Cottoned on to what?” She was grinning as if she already knew the answer but wanted the entertainment of him having to actually say it. Why did Scorpius get stuck with such an evil mother? It was preferably to Draco’s silence, though; he still hadn’t got up the guts to look at him. 

“Uh,” Scorpius said, blushing profusely. “Onto uh, how I… I fancied him before he asked me to pretend to date him?”

Astoria laughed, and later, when Scorpius asked why, she said she had been laughing _at_ him but it was also with him, for him. She was happy that the world included two fifteen-year-old boys stumbling through a convoluted scheme only for the pretense to become real and bring them both joy. Scorpius had never lived through a war, so he couldn’t understand the thrill his mother felt at the evidence that pure, silly pockets of joy were possible. That Scorpius had been so nervous to tell them about this, instead of having to confess that the Dark Lord had given him the task of murdering one of the most prominent wizards in Britain. When Scorpius said this was an oddly specific example, she changed the subject.

In the present, Astoria stood on her tiptoes to give Scorpius a kiss on the forehead and it was the confirmation that she wasn’t bothered at all by his choice in boyfriend that gave him the courage to look at his father.

He couldn’t read his expression at all.

“There weren’t any… other single Hufflepuffs to date?” Draco said slowly.

Scorpius’s stomach sank. “Yeah, but… I… I didn’t want to date them, I wanted to date Al.”

And instead of proclaiming that he had no son, or telling him he had to dump Al, or hexing him all the way to Tahiti (saving him the problem of acquiring the paperwork for a Portkey trip that long), Draco just leant back against the kitchen island and said, “I can’t believe you got a Potter to fancy you.”

Astoria snorted as her attempt to smother her giggles failed spectacularly. “What?” said Scorpius, feeling like he was definitely missing some essential context.

“How did you do it? Get him to fancy you?” Draco asked, a hint of a smile finally convincing Scorpius that he was not about to die an untimely death.

“Uh, I dunno? I mean, I held his hand a lot?” Scorpius thought about his spectacularly weak excuse for kissing Al at the quidditch match and went even redder. 

“Well,” said Draco, straightening up and brushing down his already spotless robes. “We’ll have to meet him. Ask him to stay for a week, we’re not going to Belgium until August.”

“I--alright?” Scorpius said, thrown by the sudden turn this had taken. “I don’t think he’s going away these holidays, so I’ll ask him.”

“Of course he’s not,” Draco said quietly, rolling his eyes. “Potter—” He cut himself off, apparently remembering his present company. 

Well, at least he’d never have to learn the _passé simple_. Recognising his baffling but welcome stroke of luck, Scorpius escaped before anything stranger could happen.

* * *

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this nervous,” Scorpius said as they walked back from the apparition point towards Malfoy Manor. “Watching you be nervous is almost enough to make me forget I’m also shitting bricks about this.”

Albus ran his hand through his hair for the third time in five minutes. Scorpius thought it might have been brushed when he’d side-along apparated with Ginny, but it was now a thoroughly dishevelled mess. “Piss off. It’s weird actually caring what parents think about me, alright?”

Scorpius stopped walking and scoffed. “Come off it, this whole thing started because you cared so much about what your parents thought that you asked me to pretend to be your boyfriend!” He shook his head. “Not that I’m complaining, mind,” he added, stooping a little to give Albus a kiss.

“No I didn’t,” grumbled Al, but it was only after he’d leant over in an attempt to prolong the kiss, so Scorpius knew he wasn’t really angry.

“That was literally the reasoning you used,” Scorpius teased. 

Albus grumbled wordlessly and they walked a few moments in silence before he finally said, “Fine, fine, I guess it’s...it’s weird to be properly worried that it could go pear-shaped. Your parents could _genuinely not like me_.”

“Now you know how I felt at Christmas,” Scorpius said, laughing, because if he stopped laughing he was afraid he really was going to take a survey of Albus’s knowledge of irregular verbs before relocating to a small island in the Pacific. Laughing at Albus meant he wasn’t thinking about the actual _words_ Albus was saying and how he was absolutely, terrifyingly correct.

Albus’s hand tightened around his as the Manor finally came into view, hidden by trees until they were almost close enough to read the wanky Latin motto inscribed above the front door. 

They had just reached the steps when Astoria opened the door. Scorpius rolled his eyes as he realised she had definitely been waiting for them to come into view.

“I’m Astoria, Scorpius’s mother,” Astoria said, and Albus tried to unobtrusively let go of Scorpius’s hand and wipe his own on his trousers before shaking her hand. (Scorpius could tell he failed because once again his mother looked like she was trying not to laugh.)

“Albus. Uh, Potter,” Albus said, as if by age sixteen he was not sufficiently practiced at saying his own name.

“I can’t believe we haven’t met before,” Astoria said as she led them into the entranceway. “Just leave your bag there, Telly will take it upstairs,” she said as an aside before continuing, “I’ve heard plenty about you, though perhaps not as much as I would have if you’d had a different surname.”

Scorpius squeezed Albus’s hand in an attempt at reassurance, because he could tell Astoria was amused, but Albus probably couldn’t. “I’ve heard, uh, some about you?” Albus offered. “My mum said—” He hesitated, and Scorpius looked at him concerned until he continued, “She said good things.” Scorpius had never heard his mother mention Ginny at all.

Astoria stopped to look at Albus, and she looked… sad? (Later, when Scorpius asked about it, she refused to talk about it.) The moment was gone as quickly as it came, though, and she turned back with a smile, straightening her shoulders before she gave a perfunctory knock on the sitting room door.

“Draco, the boys are here,” she called as they entered. Draco was sitting in his favourite chair and reading a book with studied nonchalance. Scorpius was sure that just like Astoria, he had been waiting for them and possibly couldn’t even say what book he’d been pretending to read.

“Po--Albus,” Draco said, holding out his hand which Albus took. Scorpius had seen that look before, when Professor Chowdhury had asked them all to pet the cats they were supposed to turn into cauldrons. When the cat yawned, displaying a mouth full of sharp teeth, Albus had screamed.

“S-Sir,” Albus stammered. Draco, for reasons Scorpius could not discern, smiled.

“Sit down boys," Astoria said, and Scorpius sat on the sofa, Albus squishing next to him despite there not being quite enough room for two sixteen-year-old boys. Astoria smiled in that specific way that Scorpius knew meant she was laughing at him. She could laugh all she liked, _he_ was very comfortable, thank you very much. The feeling of Albus against his side was calming -- and he needed all the calming he could get, what with his father looking like a prowling lion who just saw a wounded antelope.

"Telly!" Astoria called, and there was a pop as Telly the house-elf arrived in the room. He was wearing clothes (by the technical definition), although house-elf fashions had not yet progressed beyond loose unisex dresses, specially fashioned by dressmakers working in the blossoming house-elf clothing industry. Scorpius couldn't even remember a time before Telly wore clothes, but the history books had quite a lot to say about it.

"Yes, mistress?" Telly said.

"Could you get a pot of tea? And -- Albus, would you like tea?" 

"Um, yes, please," Albus said, hands twisting in his lap. Had he noticed that Draco had been appraising him? 

"Four teacups, please, Telly," Astoria said, and the house elf nodded before disappearing again with another pop.

"How were your OWL results, Albus?" Astoria asked, sitting on the chair next to Draco's. 

"Alright," Albus said, shrugging.

Scorpius rolled his eyes. "Heaps better than mine," he said, elbowing him. "He's too modest."

Albus blushed and Scorpius couldn't help his smug smile. His boyfriend got _all Es_. 

"I must admit, I never thought I'd be entertaining a Potter," Draco said. "You don't seem much like your father, though. I suppose I should have known from your House." Scorpius was… pretty sure Draco wasn't trying to insult Albus? Probably? Before he could exchange a frantic glance with his mother, Albus straightened up slightly next to him.

"The Sorting Hat wanted to put me in Slytherin," Albus said. "I -- I said I didn't want to be in Slytherin, that I wanted to be in Hufflepuff instead because Scorpius got Sorted right before me and --" He seemed to run out of steam, blushing again. "The Sorting Hat said that with that reason I'd probably do alright in Hufflepuff, so it put me there."

Scorpius forgot to even care what his father's face looked like because he was too busy staring in wonder at Albus. "Is that true, Al?"

Albus bit his lip. God but he looked so cute with his face all red like that. "Yeah. Sorting Hat was all 'but you have thriving ambition! Slytherin could help you achieve your dreams!' but -- I mean, you were -- you know," he trailed off. 

The room was distracted from Albus's burning face when Telly popped back, this time with a tea tray. (It was probably for the best; Scorpius doubted his parents actually wanted to see him snogging his boyfriend in the drawing room.)

"Milk? Sugar?" Astoria asked, already preparing the other three cups in the usual way.

"Lots of milk, please," Albus said, and gratefully accepted a hideously milky concoction.

Al may have all Es in his OWL results, but he still had shit taste in tea.

"And will you be following your father into the Ministry?" Draco asked, sipping his tea.

Albus shook his head. "I'd rather snog a skrewt. I'm not sure what I _do_ want to do, but the further it is from Dad and James the better." 

Scorpius thought that the look Draco gave Albus while Al was too busy staring into his tea was… almost approval? 

"What about your plans for the rest of the holidays, Albus?" asked Astoria.

He shrugged. "Uh, we'll probably be going to Nana's for a bit? I don't think we have any big plans. I hear you're going to Belgium, though?" 

As Astoria told Albus about how they'd be visiting various places, popping over the border into France to visit relatives, and boring the life out of Scorpius for two weeks, Scorpius was able to take a deep breath and smile. This was good! He was doing well! His parents had met his boyfriend who was related to his dad's old school nemesis and they seemed to like him!

Perhaps for his next trick, Scorpius would cure lycanthropy. Clearly he could do _anything_.

* * *

They were released from the drawing room eventually, and Scorpius managed to lead Albus all the way to his room before snogging him thoroughly. He had the best boyfriend in the world.

The best boyfriend in the world froze and pulled away from him. Scorpius frowned, confused -- he was the one facing the door, and he hadn't heard Telly appear (though if Telly had, he wouldn't tell on them). 

"Wha--" he said, turning around, but the word died in his throat as he realised what Albus was looking at.

In hindsight, it was absurd that he had managed to forget about his lifesize cardboard cutout of Viktor Krum, the greatest seeker of the last fifty years.

Scorpius waited for the inevitable 'Scorpius, how could you, I thought you hated quidditch like I did' but just as Albus was opening his mouth to probably do just that, the lifesize cardboard Viktor Krum...winked.

Albus burst into giggles.

"So _that's_ how you knew you were gay," he snickered. Scorpius hoped his silence could be read as some kind of denial but knew the fact that his face felt like it was on fire meant Albus would see right through him.

Turning to him at last with a wicked grin, Albus patted him on the shoulder. "Don't worry, Uncle Ron had a crush on Viktor Krum when he was at school too. I mean, he was way younger then, but still."

Scorpius gaped. 

"Oh, don't get me wrong, Uncle Ron denies it, but Auntie Hermione insists it's true. And I'd probably put money on her telling the truth."

Scorpius nodded, though he had never met either of them. And despite the fact that he was a Malfoy, that he'd been to dinner parties hosted by every surviving family of the Sacred Twenty-Eight… he was not expecting what Albus said next.

"He came to Christmas once. I have never seen Auntie Hermione blush so much before in my life."

He found his voice at last. "You what?"

"Well, I mean, Auntie Hermione dated him briefly when they were both at school," Albus explained patiently.

"No, no, that is not what I'm -- you're saying Viktor Krum, Viktor Krum the quidditch player, best seeker since Asako Mori… he came to yours… for Christmas."

"Yeah?" Albus said, as if it were not a big deal that he'd casually had Scorpius's first ever crush over for Christmas dinner.

"I… wow." 

"You're a Malfoy! You have dinner parties with former Ministers and Order of Merlin recipients and stuff all the time!"

"So do you," Scorpius pointed out.

"Yeah but it doesn't count if they're my _relatives_."

"Whatever, anyway, do you--"

"Hang on," Albus said, his face lighting up as he remembered how this conversation began. "Why _do_ you have a lifesize Viktor Krum in your room?"

This was exactly the question Scorpius had been dreading. He'd rather go back to how his boyfriend's aunt's ex-boyfriend had made him gay. 

"Um. Well." He cast around for something that would distract Albus from the way he was just standing there waiting with his eyebrows raised. He had nothing. "I. When I was little I mayhavewantedtobeaquidditchplayerjustalittlebit."

"Sorry?" said Albus. Scorpius was genuinely not sure whether he was forcing him to repeat it just for fun or whether he'd actually not heard.

"When I was little -- you know, we all… we all think silly things when we're little and I… wanted to be a quidditch player."

There was silence. Was this enough to get dumped? Scorpius _hoped_ not, but… well. Weirder things had happened.

"And… what happened to that dream?" Albus said carefully.

Scorpius kept his eyes on Albus's shoes instead of his face. "Turns out I was shit at quidditch."

"You fouled Dom well enough at Christmas," Albus said, and Scorpius shrugged. 

"That's because she wasn't flying to avoid me -- and there were heaps of times I failed to foul her, too. I don't fall off my broom or anything, I'm just not… good at it."

"And Viktor Krum stayed in your room because..."

"Shove off," Scorpius said, rolling his eyes. "You're only here for a week, and you'd rather discuss which celebrity I had a crush on when I was thirteen than kiss me? I am offended."

He pulled his best offended face and Albus finally, _finally_ took his face in his hands and kissed him. Just as Scorpius's hand was making its way under Albus's shirt, though, Telly appeared with a pop.

Albus jumped, putting his hands behind his back and looking as if Telly had just caught him fingerpainting on the wall.

"Mistress requests your presence for dinbolly," Telly said. completing ignoring the somewhat compromising position he had found them in.

Scorpius groaned.

"What's dinbolly?" Albus said as Telly disappeared again. 

"Card game," Scorpius said, making sure his clothes were all in order and grabbing a brush off his bedside table to neaten his hair. "It's not like I have anyone else to play with, so Mum and Dad would play cards with me and it just became a tradition? I assumed they wouldn't do it with you here but..." He shrugged. 

"And I used to wish I was an only child," Albus said with a scoff. 

"You know what they say about wishes being horses you can't look in the mouth or whatever," Scorpius said.

There was silence from Albus for a moment before he said, "... No, Scorp, I don't. What do they say about that?"

Scorpius waved his hair brush and then went back to trying to get that one knot out. "You know what I mean. I take it you don't know how to play dinbolly, then, if you don't know what it is?"

"Absolutely not," Albus said as he took the brush Scorpius offered him.

"You'll pick up the rules easy enough, and Mum'll explain them."

"I, um, I don't think I've ever won a card game, no matter what we played," Albus said as they went down the stairs. "I mean, Mum was usually playing, and I have never seen her lose at cards, so maybe that skewed the results slightly. But still."

"You'll be fine, I promise. You don't have to win." Scorpius couldn't resist giving him one last kiss before they entered the drawing room again, although this time some of the furniture had been moved to accommodate a small table and four chairs.

Astoria smiled as they entered. "I'm so glad you're here, Albus. It's rare that we get a fourth person, and dinbolly is more fun the more players you have."

"I don't know how to play," Albus said, hovering as if there was still a chance for him to escape. (There absolutely was not.)

"No matter, we'll teach you," Astoria said cheerfully, gesturing to the chair to her left, which Albus gingerly sat in. 

Scorpius mostly tuned out his mother explaining the rules. Once the game was under way it wasn't like he could help Albus, either -- it wasn't a game where you had a hand and planned in advance, just a pile in front of you that you picked up from. When certain combinations of cards were revealed and placed in the middle, you had to be the first one to slap the pile. Perhaps if they were playing against complete novices, Scorpius could elbow him whenever there was a valid slap, but the Malfoys had got the game down to an art and rarely missed anything. 

The first few rounds Albus was quiet, rarely even making a go for the slap. Sometimes Scorpius could tell he didn't notice it (especially the time Astoria successfully pulled off a top-and-tail -- Scorpius could _never_ remember the very first card of the pile and he had no idea how she did it), but other times he just hesitated for that crucial moment. 

"Albus, you'll never win a round if you never try to take it," Draco said, his eyes on the cards instead of Albus.

"Go on, Al," Scorpius said, grinning. Look at that! His dad was being friendly! He basked for a moment in the knowledge that he would never have to learn a lick more French -- until he remembered that he was in fact going to Belgium in a fortnight. It didn't dampen his spirits much, though.

Albus nodded, swallowing and straightening his shoulders. "Right," he said.

There was silence for an entire minute as everyone put down cards and absolutely nothing came up. Then Scorpius played a ten of wands and Astoria played a ten of coins and there was a moment of chaos as everyone tried to slap the pile.

Instead of the dull sound of a palm hitting cards, there was the higher, sharper sound of flesh against flesh. Albus snatched his hand away as if burned and Scorpius went to kiss it (and then tease him about his low pain threshold) but he frowned as he saw that Albus had paled so much Scorpius thought he would faint. When he looked back at the table, he realised why: his father was currently sweeping the pile of cards towards himself, the back of his hand already turning red.

"I'm so sorry sir," Albus blurted, standing up so fast he knocked his chair over and sprinting from the room.

As Scorpius followed him, he could hear his mother laughing so hard she was reduced to gasping little squeaks.

* * *

"Look," Scorpius said as he held Albus and stroked his hair. He'd managed to convince him not to flee back home immediately, but Albus still hadn't looked up from where his face was mashed against Scorpius's shoulder, so he still had a way to go convincing him that he would not, in fact, die the moment he set foot out of the room.

"Think of it like this, Al. You slapped Draco Malfoy, your dad's school nemesis. Something he's never done. You've done the Potter name proud! He might even bake you a cake."

There was a muffled sound that could have been a laugh but equally could have been a sob. 

"If nothing else, it'll definitely bump you up in the favourite child ranking."


End file.
